• i8g6 J Elliot, George Xezvbold Lawrence. c 



the high woods where is now Third Avenue and 20th Street. At 

 the time the Robins were migrating there would frequently be 

 seen large flocks of Meadowlarks (Sturnella magna) going south, 

 and they would congregate in great numbers in what were then 

 pasture fields, about where Broadway and 40th Street now is. 

 He tells of skating from where the Tombs now stand in Centre 

 Street, down the Canal that ran through the middle of Canal 

 Street, passing under the wooden bridge that spanned it at Broad- 

 way, onto the Lispenard's meadows which stretched away to the 

 Hudson River. To those of us who are conversant with the 

 localities in the metropolis just mentioned, it seems strange indeed 

 to hear one who has but just left us speak of them as familiar 

 ground to him, when they were yet covered in great part by the 

 primeval woods. It brings to our minds more forcibly than almost 

 anything else can what seventy-five years in the life of our country, 

 and of one single witness means. 



It was while the Lawrences were living at Forest Hill that I. T. 

 Audubon purchased several acres and built his house in what is 

 now known as Audubon Park. Lawrence became intimate with 

 his sons, Victor and John, yet he saw but little of the naturalist 

 himself, who was then failing in health. 



While thus studying the feathered tribes in his youth and early 

 manhood, his knowledge did not extend beyond that gained from 

 observation of birds' habits, and such appreciation of the subject 

 as the possession of a few specimens enabled him to acquire, but 

 ornithology as a science was unknown to him. Thus time passed 

 on, and Lawrence was recognized as the successful merchant with, 

 perhaps to a few of his friends, a great fondness for birds, but 

 there was no evidence that he was in later years to become one 

 of the great triumvirate, of what has been termed the Bairdian 

 Epoch of American Ornithology. 



In the year 1841 occurred one of those apparently trifling 

 incidents in one's life that often alter its entire current, and 

 which in this instance served to change Lawrence's interest in 

 birds (which up to this period had been merely regarded as a 

 pastime) into a serious scientific study. He and J. P. Giraud, 

 who were among the first to make collections of birds found in 

 the United States, were invited by Mr. J. G. Bell to come to his 



